New York Giants 27, Green Bay Packers 13. It was another disappointing loss for the Packers, who are not only suffering from the loss of Aaron Rodgers, but the continued poor play of the defense.
If there’s any good news, it’s this. The Packers are 5-5 and they’re still only one game behind the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions, who share the NFC North lead at 6-4.
If there’s anything else to stop you from jumping off a bridge, it’s that the hapless Minnesota Vikings come to town this week. In the meantime, here are five more thoughts on Sunday’s debacle.
Play calling is a problem
We’re going to stop harping on the stupid call that turned into the Jason Pierre-Paul pick six for a second. The play calling as a whole was a problem on Sunday. Coach Mike McCarthy admitted as much after the game. During the game, the Giants were stacking the box to stop Eddie Lacy. They were successful, as Lacy averaged only 1.9 yards per carry. When the opposing team gears up to stop the run, you run play action. Does anyone remember seeing any play action on Sunday? If the Packers ran it, they didn’t do it very often. We said it before the game, the Packers would have to use the pass to set up the run. They clearly didn’t do that on Sunday.
You never know which Mason Crosby is going to show up
Last week, Crosby missed two very makable field goals on his way to a 2-for-4 day. On Sunday, Crosby went 2-for-2, including a 57-yarder at the end of the half that cut the Giants’ lead to four. What are the Packers going to get from this guy week-to-week? I think it’s safe to say no one knows.
Remember when the Packers were virtually guaranteed a positive turnover differential?
That seems like a distant memory. The Packers currently have a -6 turnover differential. Only three teams in the league have a worse differential. The problem is two-fold. This Packers defense can’t create turnovers. The Packers have just four interceptions on the season, which is the lowest total in the league. Their nine total takeaways are second worst. The other issue is no Aaron Rodgers. In the past two weeks, Scott Tolzien has thrown five interceptions. Rodgers had just four in the eight games he’s played in this season.
You’re getting Brad Jones, whether you like it or not
Did you see all the plays Jamari Lattimore made on Sunday? No? Oh, that’s because he wasn’t on the field. The Packers went with Brad Jones for the entire game, unlike previous weeks. Jones turned in an uneven performance. On the positive side, he had a team-leading 13 tackles, including three for loss, and a sack. On the negative side, he got ran over and missed tackles on at least a couple occasions. Are we saying Lattimore would have played better? Well, we’ll never know.
The defensive line is going backwards
Mike Daniels and C.J. Wilson led all defensive linemen with two tackles a piece on Sunday. Johnny Jolly got hurt and missed a large portion of the game, so at least he has an excuse. B.J. Raji — the supposed $8 million a year man? Didn’t show up on the stat sheet. The same goes for Ryan Pickett. Datone Jones had a QB hit, but that was it. We’re not sure what happened to this unit, which looked like the strength of the team early in the season, but clearly some of these guys are no longer getting the job done.
How come we are the only team in the NFL that can’t seem to just kick a touchback? Every team in the NFL brings the ball out to the 35 yd. line…
I dunno, but we did stop one return at the 19 and another around the 12 that I can remember…so that was nice at least
What happened to Masthay doing kick offs?
And whenever we catch one in the end zone we bring it all the way out to the 13 yard line….
red zone offence was also terrible. Stats wise Tolzien was winging it about for the last 2 weeks but coming away with field goals far too often
Giants were a team hitting harder, running to the football faster & could smell blood. They felt our lack of confidence with a 3rd-string QB. They’re on a winning streak.
They were very confident on 3rd & 1…4th & 1.
Eddie Lacy is no longer having fun in our offense with Rodgers gone. He can’t get past 3 yards. We have no deep threat on a constant basis.
We need to “Steal a win” vs. the Queens next week at home & hope Rodgers comes to play on Thanksgiving.
Is it me or does it look like some “quit” is taking hold of this team. They look like guys trying to not get hurt before the season ends. I am also wondering if Jolly is just shot, had my doubts he would hold up for a whole season.
The Lattimore situation reminds me of Bishop a few years back when they kept him on the bench so we could all enjoy Nick Barnett ride a guy for 8 yds and then demo his awesome samurai skills.
I am not convinced they can beat the fucking Queens. When you combine Adrian Peterson and the Packers fear of tackling you get a debacle. Fuck. Fingers crossed.
Adrian Peterson has a bad groin injury at the moment.
Not to wish a guy bad, but I hope it’s real bad.
Out coached out coached out coached,there I said it but I dont feel any better,this staff needs to evalute it self,wait that wont work they evaluate the talent and play brad jones instead of lattimore.I am so disgusted.
Of all the defensive calamity yesterday, Brad Jones played decent.
EXACTLY! Point 5 is right on. Nearly all of the Packers defensive woes could be boiled down to the lack of a pass rush– for the third year in a row! This fact along with the fact that our last two drafts have been dedicated to defense, point to the DC as the problem.
Apparently I was more impressed with Brad Jones than others were.
Our WRs continue to play well. At least a couple times a game we should be flinging it down the sideline and giving those guys chances to make plays. If they are going to stack the box, then they have to live with single coverage on our WRs. You make them pay for it. It doesn’t take a great pass; you just put it anywhere our WR can catch it.
If Carolina wins tonight, it is pretty much division title or bust for the entire NFC North.
Agreed on the D line…they simply could not get to Manning with our standard look. And when we blitzed we still were not very effective. And these D-backs and safeties in coverage with little help is not good for us.
The play calling was not good. Run-run-pass is terrible. It’s exactly what the Giants were expecting, and putting Tolzien in 3rd and long with an empty backfield tells the Giants exactly what’s coming and allows them to bring the house. I’d have to rewatch the game, which I wouldn’t wish on anyone, but how many first downs did we get on first down? I can remember maybe 1 or 2.
Run, run, pass 3rd and long sounds about right.
Anyone watch the playoffs the last 2 years in a row and see the asks packers go one and done? Well hello it’s the same defense making the exact some stupid mistakes and yet capers keeps his job, McCarthy is afraid to fire him
Defense has been suspect for several years now. No pass rush and no take aways means TOP for the opponent not to mention 3 and outs by the Rodgers-less offense. I wonder if it is equal parts coaching and players intelligence, especially in the zone defense. Maybe our players are not smart enough to fully understand their responsibilities and therefore continually find themselves out of position. No excuses for piss poor tackling. I hope that we can beat the queens but hope is not a method.
Seriously?
Crosby had one bad week this whole year…
If the Pack loses to the Vikes this weekend, the season is over. This situation just goes to show how important a talented back up QB is. Either you spend the money for a quality back up QB or you pay a very heavy price if your starter goes down.
It’s very sad to me as a fan to think that we might only have one good player on our team that being Aaron Rodgers. That would make us no better than the Vikings. I refuse to believe this. I know that there is plenty of talent on the present Packer team. I could go on and on about each player that I feel could be considered a playmaker and a game changer. But that is not where the problem lies. When the going gets tough the tough get going. That is what I would expect from our players. I do view many of them as tough competitors. Of course, there are the few who are not in that category to me and frankly never will be. We all know who they are. (Tramon, Newhouse….) I was impressed with Tramons play this past week however, but wonder if he can maintain that same veracity in the upcoming games. In the end, if you don’t have great coaches with great football minds to go along with a teams talent, all the talent in the world won’t be worth a shit.